Jun 5, 2009 6:51 am US/Eastern
NY EMT Accused Of Posting Corpse Photo On Facebook
Body Was That Of Caroline Wimmer, A Staten Island Resident Brutally Strangled In March With Hair Dryer Cord
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
Prosecutors said Thursday an EMT took a cell-phone photo of a corpse while working a crime scene and posted it on Facebook.
Mark Musarella was awaiting arraignment Thursday on an official misconduct charge. Defense lawyer Edward J. Pavia Jr. says Musarella will plead not guilty.
Pavia said the photo was posted by accident, and Musarella is sorry.
Musarella was working for Richmond University Medical Center on March 30 and responded to an emergency call on Staten Island. The victim, Caroline Wimmer, was found strangled with the cord of a hair dryer.
Prosecutors said Musarella snapped a picture of Wimmer's body and posted the image on his page on the social networking Web site.
Musarella faces up to a year in jail if convicted. The private hospital has fired him.
A lawyer for Wimmer's family says prosecuting Musarella will "keep society civil."
Wimmer was found dead March 30 in her West Brighton apartment, beaten and strangled with the hair dryer cord. Charged in the killing was 28-year-old Calvin Lawson of Brooklyn.
Wimmer's parents believe their daughter was the victim of an Internet-inspired murder after postings on MySpace. They said there were rumors posted that Lawson was having an affair with their daughter, which her parents said was not true.
"He beat her for a lie. Gossip that you expect from high school. That's what it was -- a lie," mother Marti Wimmer said.
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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